1. Technical Field
The present invention relates generally to communications in an asynchronous transfer mode (ATM) network. More specifically, the present invention relates to communicating data between emulated local area networks (ELANs).
2. Description of the Related Art
In current ATM networks, most data which is sent from one ELAN to another may pass through a bridge and associated local area network emulation clients (LECs). However, passing all of this information through a bridge presents problems. First, the bridge/LEC combination can act as a bottleneck to the flow of information if the processing power of the bridge is not sufficient. It would therefore be desirable to allow one ATM attached device to communicate with another without involving the bridge. Such a system would remove the bridge as a potential performance bottleneck.